


hot night (wind was blowing)

by wayfaringwaif



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Office, M/M, Meet-Cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-30
Updated: 2014-09-30
Packaged: 2018-02-19 07:48:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,504
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2380478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wayfaringwaif/pseuds/wayfaringwaif
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ryan's fairly certain this is some kind of conflict of interest, but that means airing out his personal life and god, he's not sure he's ready for the mortification of telling his boss about a random he boned.</p><p>He didn't even know Gabe's last name until half an hour ago.</p><p>(Or: Ryan bangs a random. Who turns out to be auditing his office. MotherFUCK.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	hot night (wind was blowing)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [jbmaunier](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jbmaunier/gifts).



> For maunnier. I'm not quite sure if this is what you had in mind, but I really enjoyed getting to write Ryan and Gabe again! Thanks for such a great prompt, and I hope you like it anyway, even though this is more of an Accounting AU rather than a Finance one.
> 
> Thanks to everyone I bugged about this, hapakitsune and intrepidy, especially, who told me which bits worked and which didn't.
> 
> This fic probably wouldn't exist without opusculasedfera. Thanks for the handholding (literally and figuratively) and for nudging me to finish it, even though I wanted to stop at 1800 words and not even have them kiss. She also fixed all of my terrible grammar errors and reminded me that Nick Schultz has not been an Oiler in quite some time. She's basically the best ever <3\. 
> 
> All remaining mistakes are mine!

Ryan blinks, taken aback, as his arm hits a warm, solid figure in the bed. He glances at the clock, _3:37 AM_ , and a rush of remembrance flows through him. Right. He picked up last night.

He doesn't normally take people home with him. It's not like he has a hard and fast rule about it, it's just not a thing he does very often. Or, well, going out, really. He doesn't go out much, but Hallsy had insisted last night, and Ryan had relented after receiving a multitude of texts, ranging from, _Come on, Nuge, it'll be fun_ , to _don't be such a monk, fuckface_. 

He shifts, trying to put some more space between him and his guest -- Ryan tries to remember his name: Gabe, he thinks -- but there’s a hand on his stomach, firm and heavy, and he's pulled closer towards the guy.

"Go back to sleep," probably-Gabe says, his voice sounding gravelly.

Ryan's about to protest, but Gabe is warm, comfortable, and he lets out a yawn he didn't know he'd been holding. He closes his eyes.

Whatever, he'll deal with this in the morning.

*

Ryan wakes up with a start, his alarm clock blaring in his ear.

 _7:51 AM_.

He must have hit the snooze button a few times. Christ, he's going to be late. He reaches for Gabe beside him - he needs to get up, they both do, if Ryan's going to make it to work only sort of a little bit late. But the space beside him is empty, the sheets rumpled and bunched up.

Gabe's gone, and okay, it shouldn't be a surprise for Ryan because whatever, Gabe was a random. There's a small, unexpected twist in his stomach, and he partly wishes Gabe had maybe stayed this morning, but then, it’s probably just hunger pangs. He is kind of really hungry. 

Plus, it's not like Ryan is in a state to entertain or try for round two right now. He maybe has time to throw Gabe a power bar and nudge him outside the door. It's not very good one-night stand etiquette, probably, if there is such a thing, and Ryan guesses it’s likely better that Gabe had left of his own volition.

Ryan stretches, shaking himself off, and pads to the bathroom. It's the beginning of audit week and god, he needs to get to work.

He spies a note on the breakfast bar on his way out, a cursive scrawl saying, "Ryan," on the folded bit and he tucks it into his jacket pocket before rushing out.

He'll read it in the office. He really is super fucking late.

*

Ryan really, really hates audit week. Really hates it.

It's only his second year at the firm, his second year going through audit week, but if this year is anything like last year's, then Ryan can only hope that he doesn't end up punching someone in the face or damaging his office's property. Much.

There's something extremely unnerving about having a stranger go through all of your documents, all of your work, combing through it all for mistakes, as if you didn't just spend an entire year working your ass off.

He's about half an hour late coming into the office. Ebs, their receptionist, shoots him an impish grin when he walks in. He knows he probably looks harried and more than a bit disheveled. Ryan flips him off.

It's way too early to deal with Ebs.

Ebs, a normal fixture to Hallsy's night outs with the boys, was absent last night. Something about a study group for his night courses, Ryan's not sure, but he's certain Hallsy had texted Ebs all of the details shortly after Ryan left the bar with Gabe.

His friends are such giant dicks.

It hasn't been more than ten minutes after he's thrown his jacket haphazardly in his cubicle, when Jeff, his manager, pops by.

"You're late, bud," Jeff states obviously, but Jeff is smiling so Ryan is probably not in trouble. "Come on, we should go now if we don't want to be standing for the meeting."

Ryan makes a face. "Do I have to? Do I really have to?" he asks pitifully. "What if I just like, I don’t know, bring Mr. Ference a mug of his dumb organic coffee from now to eternity, do you think I can get out of this?"

Jeff laughs, patting him on the shoulder. "Sorry, bud, pretty sure that's no dice," he replies. "Also, don't let Andrew hear you call him Mr. Ference."

He turns to leave and Ryan rises from his chair, trudging along behind him despondently.

Fuck audit week.

*

They're being audited by KPMG again, though they're getting new auditors this time around. Ryan doesn't really care, because it's still going to be annoying regardless, but Jeff assures him that things should hopefully be easier this time around now that they're more settled and their processes have been streamlined. 

Ference Financial is only three years old, established by Mr. Ference when he moved back home to Edmonton from Boston. Ryan's not sure why anyone would want choose to move from Boston to Edmonton voluntarily, but he supposes he can't judge, not when he's decided to stay in the city after graduating from U of A instead of moving back home to Vancouver. It also helps that there isn’t any oil to manage real estate for in Boston, probably, Ryan guesses. 

There are seven people in their finance and accounting department, and all of them, save for Jeff and Ryan, are already seated in the small conference room they walk in.

"So much for being early and beating everyone here," Ryan mutters. He sees Gags already seated, idly playing with his tablet. He tries to push Gags out of his chair, because that's so much easier than going outside to marketing and stealing one of theirs, but Gags smacks his arm.

"Get your own, latesies," Gags says snottily.

Ryan pouts. "But it's far. Way too far."

Gags looks at him balefully. "Not my problem."

He shrugs. "Okay," Ryan says, before sitting on Sam.

Gags laughs and tries to nudge Ryan out of his lap. "This is not what I meant, jerkwad."

"Whatever, you love it, this is the most action you've had all month. Don't even front," Ryan says, making no move to get up.

Gags kicks the back of his thigh lightly. "God, why are you so heavy, you shouldn't be this heavy," he whines. "Is it because your ass is so massive? It's probably because your ass is so massive."

Ryan's about to reply when he hears someone clear their throat. Mr. Ference is smiling at them from behind them. He jumps up, straightening his suit. "Erm, hey, Mr. Ference," Ryan says. He clears his throat. "Good morning, sir."

He hears Sam cough, "Suck up," under his breath and Ryan tries to discreetly kick his shin.

Mr. Ference just motions towards a now empty seat by the door. "Good morning, Ryan," he says. "I'm not sure Sam's a very comfortable chair, but this one should be all right."

Ryan feels himself redden and rushes towards the chair. He knows Mr. Ference isn't like, admonishing him or anything. Mr. Ference is actually pretty cool for a boss. Ference Financial is a lot more casual and relaxed than the other two financial firms Ryan intern for, but while Mr. Ference tries to create a friendly, fun environment in the office, Ryan still can't help but feel a bit self-conscious around him sometimes.

He takes out his tablet and notes and gets comfortable, turning his attention to the whiteboard at the front of the room.

Shit.

Mr. Ference tells the room that the meeting will start in ten minutes, and that everyone should grab coffee and pastries from the back table, but it's all muted in Ryan's head because fuck. Fuck.

Gabe from last night is standing beside Mr. Ference, staring intently at him, looking cool and collected.

He is so fucked.

*

Ryan tries to take notes as Mr. Ference and the auditing duo from KPMG outline what their goals are for this week, but Ryan feels unsettled, his stomach churning in knots.

This is a huge mess. He's not sure if he should tell Mr. Ference later about Gabe and what happened, because he's fairly certain this is some kind of conflict of interest, but that means airing out his personal life and god, he's not sure he's ready for the mortification of telling your boss about a random you boned.

He didn't even know Gabe's last name until half an hour ago (Landeskog - apparently he's Swedish, which makes a lot of sense, when Ryan thinks about the sound of Gabe's voice from last night).

Gabe keeps giving him these looks, a mix of confused and unsure and more than a few parts of flabbergasted, when he thinks Ryan's not paying attention and it's almost comforting that Gabe seems to be just as freaked out about this as he is.

Ryan's never been more glad for his lunch hour than he is at that moment. He rushes out to the cafeteria and finds a table in a tucked away corner of the room. He doesn't really feel like eating right now, but he sulks into his coffee and tries to use the relative isolation to clear his head.

He's going to kill Hallsy the next time he sees him. Clearly, this is all Hallsy's fault. If he hadn't convinced Ryan to go out last night, then Ryan wouldn't have taken Gabe home, and this mess wouldn't be that - a mess.

Ryan's in the middle of plotting Hallsy's demise (he's thinking torching Hallsy's secret Animorphs collection would be a good start), when he hears the drag of the chair in front of him.

He looks up and sees Gabe smiling sheepishly at him. "Umm, hey," Gabe starts. "This is kind of wild, eh?" Gabe's voice is soft and low, and Ryan's not sure why he hadn't noticed his accent the night before.

Ryan nods. "That's one word for it."

"I didn't know - honest. I mean, I probably shouldn't have gone out last night, but it was a long flight and long flights kind of gets me on edge," Gabe says, rambling a little. "I...really didn't know."

Ryan realises he's not even sure where Gabe lives. Toronto? Some place in the US? He tries not to hyperventilate. "It's fine," Ryan says, "I mean, not fine. I don't know. But it's not like we planned for something like this to happen."

Gabe lowers his head. "I had fun last night though. Was kind of sorry I had to leave so early," he says quietly. He's fumbling with the cuff of his shirt, and Ryan tries not to remember how Gabe's hands felt on him last night.

Ryan winces. "Listen, I should go, I have to finish a thing, and well." He gestures awkwardly with his hands towards the door. "I'll see you around, eh?"

Gabe straightens out like he's been burned and nods. "Yeah, definitely. I'll see you around," he echoes.

Ryan walks back to his cubicle, banging his head a little against his desk. This is going to be a long fucking week.

*

Working with Gabe isn't awful, per se. Gabe is thorough with his work, but not overbearingly so, and Ryan doesn't feel judged or scrutinized to within an inch of his life. It's not bad, better than working with last year's auditors, all things considered, but it's still weird. Awkward.

He tries to do them both a favour and keeps their interactions as brief and succinct as possible. He makes sure that they're never alone in the same space, not for long, and Ryan copies Jeff in all of their correspondences. Just in case.

Gabe gets this look sometimes when they're in the coffee room together accidentally or when they're on their way to the cafeteria like he wants to talk, like he wants to bring up what happened again. It's fleeting, and he's never pushy, not when Ryan looks so obviously discomfited and unsure of what to do about this _thing_ , and Ryan appreciates that.

There's a small part of him that wants to maybe get to know Gabe on a more casual basis. Ryan realises that the only thing he knows about Gabe are 1) he's Swedish, 2) he's an auditor from Colorado, and 3) he sounds really, really fucking good when he comes. He supposes that the last is probably the most important tidbit about Gabe, to be honest, but he wants to know something more that can be said in polite company.

The whole situation is strange, though, and Ryan's still not even certain if he should tell Mr. Ference about his and Gabe's prior history, as brief as that may have been.

It's not that Ryan's a stick in the mud, as much as Hallsy likes to call him that. He has fun - he just likes to have a firm separation between his personal and professional lives, and now that they've merged somewhat, he's having a hard time coping.

Ryan bumps into Gabe at the coffee room on Wednesday morning, literally. He's not really the most functional in the morning before his coffee, so he counts it a success when he didn't accidentally knock his mug over Gabe and spill his coffee all over him.

There's an awkward pause, both of them looking anywhere and everywhere but each other.

Ryan sees Gabe swallow before he clears his throat. "So, uh, good morning," Gabe says, shrugging his shoulders a little, as if to say, _oh, hi, this is kind of awkward_ , and Ryan feels him. He really does.

"Morning. How's auditing going?" Ryan asks. He stops, realizing, oh wait, is Gabe even allowed to talk to him about that? "Sorry, I mean, you don't have to tell me or anything, obviously, I just. Yeah." He feels really pathetic, but honestly, he doesn't know what to expect. Even without the _thing_ , it's not like he made conversation with the auditors from last year. Or wanted to, even.

Gabe waves him off lightly. "It's fine. Auditing's fine. Ference Financial has pretty good records - this is definitely one of the easier gigs I've done this year."

Ryan gulps unattractively. "That's good. Great. I just wasn't sure if it was okay for us to talk about, and anyway, good," he rattles. He's not really sure what to say next, and Gabe is sort of looking at him expectantly. "How are you liking Edmonton so far? Done anything interesting?"

Gabe grins. "You can say that."

And okay, so Ryan had that coming. He probably could've worded his sentence better, but in his defense, he's not properly caffeinated enough. "I meant the sights," he clarifies, shaking his head a little.

Ryan sees Ebs come into the room at the corner of his eye, and he knows Ebs is staring dubiously at them. Ebs is moving a lot slower than he normally does and Ryan wants to roll his eyes. Nosy bastard.

He's almost startled when Gabe laughs and asks, "Wait, there are sights in Edmonton?"

Ryan wants to feel affronted - maybe even defend his not-so-newly found home of five years, but Gabe's laugh sounds really distracting, his smile is even more disarming, and Ryan's kind of helpless for a few seconds. "Shut up, Edmonton is totally a storied and historically awesome city, you plebe," he says finally, hoping Gabe hadn't noticed him being a creeper. "We have like, the Rocky Mountains and stuff."

There's a really nice twinkle in Gabe's eyes, and Ryan feels like he suddenly knows what it's like being in a romance novel. They're just...very blue, and very engaging, and a lot of other superlatives Ryan is kind of having a hard time processing at the moment.

"So do we," Gabe retorts, leaning casually on the counter with all of the tea. "Edmonton doesn't have a monopoly on the Rocky Mountains. Also, isn't that like, closer to Calgary?"

Ryan takes a sip of his coffee. "That's what Calgary wants to think," he says, which, what even, he knows that doesn't even make sense, but Gabe seems entertained. “Calgary fucking blows, anyway.”

Gabe's biting his lower lip, and Ryan notices how plump they are. He wasn’t that drunk this past weekend, just a little tipsy, but the lights were off in his room and now he's sort of lamenting it, because fuck, he suddenly wants to know what Gabe's face looks like in detail when he’s being sucked off.

He wonders if Gabe bit his lips like that, if his lips reddened, swollen and well worried, that night. Ryan remembers how they felt against his lips: soft and wet and warm, and he wants to try again, wants to see if he can make Gabe--

"Fuck you, Nuge, don't even start with Calgary, Calgary is awesome," Ebs interjects, all mock fury, and Ryan is thrown back into the moment. Right. He's at work. _At work_.

Gabe raises an eyebrow. "Nuge?"

Ryan flips Ebs off before turning to Gabe. "Just a dumb name some of the boys gave me," he replies. He motions towards the door. "Anyway, I should go. Let me know if I can help with anything."

Gabe nods, and for a split second, he almost looks disappointed, but then Ryan thinks that's probably just him and his wishful thinking.

"Sure, I'll have to take you up on that, Nuge."

Ryan stops, his lips curling into a smile. "Don't call me Nuge."

*

Ryan is 87% sure he's seeing things, probably, but he swears, it feels like Gabe has been everywhere at work. Everytime he turns around, Gabe's there, a few feet away, smiling like the sun, and it's driving him absolutely fucking crazy. Wherever he goes in the office, there's Gabe around the corner, and it's exasperating and perfect all rolled into one. 

It's not that Ryan thinks Gabe is stalking him. Far from it. He can see Gabe's been hard at work all day with Paul, the other auditor, and it's just all happenstance. But it's happenstance that makes him feel like he's back in middle school with the dorkiest crush in existence. Ryan feels ridiculously out of sorts.

He tries to focus on his work, plugging in his headphones, and it works for a while. The thrumming of the music in his ears makes him forget about Gabe, finally making progress on balancing last week's receivables. The moment doesn't last long, though, because he feels a prickle at the back of his head, like someone is watching him, and he jumps a little when a firm hand lands on his shoulder.

"Hey, sorry, I didn't mean to startle you." Gabe looks at him apologetically, hands in his pockets.

Ryan wrenches his headphones off. "No big, I just didn't expect you, that's all," he says, and he kind of prides himself on keeping his voice even. Gabe must have taken off his tie, because the top three buttons of his shirt are undone, and it's extremely distracting how much more relaxed he seems. "Can I help you with anything?"

Gabe grins, waving a folder at Ryan. "Yeah, actually. Do you have time?" he asks. "I don't want to disturb you, but this won't take long at all."

Exiting out of his work, Ryan nods, taking the folder from Gabe. "Sure, what do you need?"

They discuss the invoices from September of last year, and Ryan tries to keep his attention solely on the figures, but it isn't easy, not when Gabe has pulled up a chair beside him, leaning closer as he points at the specific lines in question. Ryan can smell Gabe's cologne, and it's kind of heady, bringing him back to the first time he met Gabe at the club.

"So what do you think?"

Ryan blinks. He hadn’t meant to zone out. He blushes, embarrassed, because he really should have been paying more attention to the files, not Gabe's scent. "Uh, sorry, it's been a long day," he says lightly. "Can you run that by me again?"

Nodding, Gabe shows him the lines again. "It's fine, man, I know how it is."

This time, Ryan is a bit better at following Gabe, and they spend the next few minutes trying to see where the discrepancies could have come from.

"I mean, I don't think it's a huge deal? Just a minor error from either side," Gabe says. He pauses, his forehead wrinkling. "Do you have the original requisitions for these, maybe?"

"Should be on the network," he says. "Let me grab it for you."

It takes Ryan a while to find the files, but Gabe doesn't seem to mind, still just sitting beside him patiently. The silence should be awkward, it normally is with other people, but somehow it's not, and Ryan doesn't try to fill in the gaps.

He motions for Gabe to come take a look when he finally pulls up the requisitions. "I think this is what you're looking for?"

Gabe rises slightly, arm leaning on the desk, looming closer to see the screen. He makes a noise of approval and points at the mouse. "Do you mind?"

Ryan shakes his head. "Go ahead."

Taking over the mouse, Gabe scrolls through the documents. He's pressed against Ryan lightly, the heat of his body seeping through and Ryan shivers involuntarily. There's nothing obscene about the way they're positioned now, but still, Ryan can't help but feel affected. He's been trying to ignore bits and pieces of that night resurfacing, and having Gabe so close, having Gabe against him, even in this capacity, is throwing him off.

"You okay?" Gabe asks, eyebrow raised.

Ryan forces a smile. "Yeah, fine, why wouldn't I be fine?"

"Well, you are that, fine." Gabe smirks, almost playfully, and Ryan just rolls his eyes.

"That was kind of terrible, bud," he says back, but he's blushing, he knows.

Gabe turns his head back to the screen. "Yeah, well, you're kind of driving me crazy," he says, voice low. "Guess we're even, huh?"

Suddenly finding them dry, Ryan licks his lips. "Must be my Excel skills," he says, maybe a little nervously.

Gabe laughs, head thrown back, and Ryan traces the lines of Gabe's neck with his eyes. There's a tiny bead of sweat just above Gabe's collar, and Ryan kind of wants to lick it. It should feel weird, and it doesn't make sense at all, but Ryan just...he just _wants_.

"Something like that," Gabe murmurs, "though I think --"

There's a loud scuffle behind them. "Hey Nuge, Hallsy wants to know if you're coming to league night tonight."

They spring apart abruptly. Ryan clears his throat. He doesn't know whether to thank Ebs for his interruption or punch him square on the jaw. "That's tonight?"

Ebs makes a face. "Duh," he says. "It's Wednesday, Nuge. It's always league night on Wednesdays."

Shrugging, Ryan says, "All right, I guess." He shoos Ebs out, before smiling sheepishly at Gabe. He needs to get back to work before he throws himself pathetically at Gabe. "Did you need anything else?"

"If you can send that to me, that'd be great, thanks," Gabe says. He looks so composed. Ryan hates him a little. He stands there for a while, just looking at Ryan, like he’s about to say something, but he must have decided against it, because Gabe mock salutes at him, grinning slightly, before walking away.

Ryan doesn’t even know where to begin with that.

*

Ryan walks into his cubicle the next morning, still bleary eyed and out of it. He barely notices the Second Cup coffee on his desk, almost knocking it over. Thank god he caught himself in time. He really doesn't want to be dealing with spilt coffee this early in the morning.

There's a post it attached on the sleeve, saying, _"Thanks for your help - coffee's on me."_ There isn't a signature included but he wagers it's from Gabe. Unless he was somehow nicer than normal to everyone else yesterday without him realising it, and, well.

It's not what he normally drinks, but Ryan is thankful anyway, if only because it means he doesn't have to move from his desk for at least half an hour. He makes a mental note to send an email to Gabe, though maybe quite a bit later, when he's somewhat more capable of stringing along more than two syllables at a time.

He doesn't actually get a chance to send that email to Gabe, because Gabe drops by his desk a little past ten, faux knocking on the edge of his cubicle wall. Ryan thinks he shouldn't find this charming, and had it been Ebs, he probably would've rolled his eyes, but coming from Gabe, it sort of fits.

"You got a minute?" Gabe asks. Ryan has all of the minutes, for Gabe, especially, but he's not going to say that out loud.

Ryan turns to him. "Is it the requisitions from yesterday?"

Gabe hums, nodding. "I think I'm still missing something. Another set of eyes might help, probably. I figured I'd ask you since you took a peek at it with me."

"Sure, what do you need?"

Gabe shuffles on the spot, and Ryan could swear he looks sort of nervous. "Actually, I have to run to a meeting right now, but I was thinking maybe I could buy you lunch and we can take a look at it then?"

Ryan folds his arms over his chest. "Over lunch?" he asks, confused. He doesn't know why they would need to go over it during lunch and not later that afternoon, but it's not like he's doing anything special over lunch, anyway. "Actually, yeah, that's fine. Just come get me when you're done with your meeting."

Gabe beams. "Yeah? Awesome, uh, all right, it's a date, then."

Before Ryan could reply, he hears Jeff call for him from the other side of the room. He yells back, letting Jeff know he'll be right there. He grabs his files off his desk, throwing, "Just shoot me an email if you need me to print anything out," at Gabe before rushing out to his manager's office.

Date.

Yeah, he’s not going to think about that now. 

*

Gabe comes to get him just shortly after noon. It's sort of a nice break, having worked through a giant stack of ridiculousness that morning, and Ryan welcomes the distraction.

"You ready to go?" Gabe asks, placing a hand on Ryan's shoulders.

"Yeah, just let me get my stuff," Ryan says. "Might be hard finding a table in the lunch room now, but we can always bum some seats off people, if we need to."

"Actually, I was thinking we can go out? The weather's pretty nice." Gabe looks sort of shifty, like he's not sure how Ryan will take his suggestion.

"Out, as in outside?"

"Yes? Is outside not a thing Edmontonians do?" Gabe says teasingly.

Scoffing, Ryan shakes his head. "I think I know a place. Come, we can take my car." He motions for Gabe to follow. "Also, nobody fucking says Edmontonian. Do people say Denverian? Is that a thing?"

The elevator dings and Gabe just pushes him inside. "Whatever you say, dear."

*

The thing is, they don't actually make it outside. Well, they make it outside, in a sense that they make it out to Ryan's car.

Everything's kind of hazy after that.

He's not really even sure how it started, but one minute, he's fiddling with the controls of his radio while he waits for his car to warm up, and the next, he's being cornered against the door, Gabe laying practically on top of him.

Ryan doesn't know who kissed who first, though he’s not sure really cares about semantics, not when Gabe's lips feels like that, warm and soft against his.

Grabbing the front of Ryan's shirt, Gabe bunches the fabric in his hand, using it as leverage to pull Ryan closer towards him. Gabe nips at Ryan's lower lip, and tugs, just a little, and Ryan's kind of gone.

"You make me so fucking crazy," Gabe murmurs, breathless, as he trails kisses on Ryan's cheek.

Ryan arches his back involuntarily, when Gabe kisses down to his neck, mouth closing around the juncture right below his ear. He wraps his hand around the back of Gabe's neck and pulls him up until their mouths are inches apart again. Ryan kisses him, deep and wet, and Ryan just wants _more_.

They stay like that for a while, rocking against each other almost frenziedly. It's an awkward angle and they never really quite get there, not when they're squished at the front of Ryan's car, but it feels nice. _Gabe_ feels nice.

Gabe's hand start to inch down Ryan’s stomach, fingers trailing lightly over the zipper of his pants. Ryan moans into Gabe's mouth, grinding back against his hand when Gabe starts to palm at his dick.

There's a loud, shrill beep that cuts through, and Gabe jumps, scrambling around his seat for his phone, and Ryan lets out a pathetic whine.

"Shit, yeah, sorry Stas, didn't realise it was so late. Give me like, ten minutes, and I'll be right there." It's pretty impressive how even Gabe's voice is, considering. Ryan just closes his eyes, breathing deeply.

Shit. They never even made it out of the parking lot.

Gabe kisses him, light and quick, then presses their foreheads together. "Fuck," he says quietly. "You're kind of. You're just kind of..."

"…yeah, I know," Ryan finishes for him, mumbling against Gabe's lips. The feeling is mutual. "Your boss has shitty timing."

"Not my boss," Gabe rumbles, "but yeah, not the greatest."

Ryan gives him one last peck. He really should stop. "I'll see you inside? I should probably try to look presentable."

"I don't know, you look pretty fucking presentable to me," Gabe says, not letting him go, and Ryan kind of wonders what would happen if they just say fuck it, and stay in his car all afternoon. 

It’s probably not the best idea in the world. Sadly.

"We should go," Ryan says. "Paul will probably kill you if we don't. And like, I prefer you alive, not dead."

Gabe sighs heavily, like he's being put upon. "I suppose. Dead wouldn’t be good." He straightens out his shirt and throws on his suit jacket. "Just. Call me, okay? Like, after work?"

There's a small part of Ryan that thinks they should just end this thing here. It's better that way. But Ryan has always been partial to bad ideas, so he smiles, saying, "I will, yeah, I want to see you again," and he means it. He really means it.

The walk back to the office feels so much longer than normal. They separate once they pass the lobby, Gabe heading upstairs to meet Paul.

He ignores Ebs' pointed looks on the way to the bathroom. Ryan doesn't think he looks too disheveled once he's in front of a mirror. A little red, maybe, but he certainly doesn't look like a guy who just spent his entire lunch hour making out with the auditor in his car. He hopes, at least.

Ryan tries to get back into the swing of things at his desk. Jeff’s given him a new set of transactions to balance, and he still has a bunch of emails he needs to answer. He’s about to start when he sees Gabe and Paul through his window. They’re out by the parking, looking just about ready to leave.

Shit, he’s forgotten to ask Gabe for his number.

He flicks through his most recent emails to see if Gabe’s phone number is listed on his signature, but the only thing there are the number of his temporary extension at Ference Financial and the switchboard number to the Denver office.

Ryan’s annoyed at himself for forgetting something kind of really important. What if Gabe doesn’t come back with Paul tomorrow? What if he never sees Gabe again? Clearly, things could totally change overnight. Shoving his hands in his jacket pockets, he grumpily searches for something sweet to distract him, but all he finds is a bit of crumpled up scrap paper.

He almost throws it out, before remembering: it's the same folded note from earlier this week, his name scripted in the front.

_Sorry to run out without saying goodbye, have an early start. You looked pretty cute sleeping, and I didn't want to wake you. Next time, I won't run out so quickly, promise. - Gabe, 303-255-1276_

Ryan smiles. He grabs his phone, typing in the number on the note.

 _So much for not running out so quickly the "next time" huh?_ , he texts.

He gets a reply back immediately. _That doesn't count as next time. Tonight, though, that can count as the next time._

Gabe’s kind of really presumptuous. 

That’s okay, Ryan’s pretty much a sure thing.


End file.
